


The Death-match

by arashianelf



Category: Arashi (Band)
Genre: Fluff and Crack, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-08
Updated: 2015-08-08
Packaged: 2018-04-13 16:03:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,173
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4528353
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arashianelf/pseuds/arashianelf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's time... for the annual Death-match. And it's Arashi's first time participating. Time to see who will emerge as the victor.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Death-match

**Author's Note:**

> This was partly inspired by Running Man... It really isn't as serious as the title sounds. This probably classifies as crack, I'm not very sure XD A thousand words of silliness in my brain. That probably sums it up LOL Hope you enjoy!

In the month of January of the year 2008, the five members of Arashi are brought into a conference room in the Johnny’s Entertainment main building by their seniors from the group V6.

  
They are introduced to the competition only JE talents are eligible to enter upon reaching their ninth year since their debut.

  
They are introduced to the Johnny’s Annual Death-match.

  
The Death-match is explained to them with slides that have been used numerous times to introduce it to many groups before them, like V6 themselves and other seniors like SMAP and TOKIO. 

  
Even actors like Ikuta Toma and Kazama Shunsuke are not exempt from it. Kazama, like them, would be introduced to it later on, as it was also his ninth year after debuting in acting. Toma had been in the Death-match for one year before them.

  
The Death-match was literally a fight to death, though in their case death was when a ping-pong ball with their name on it was found. On the first day of March every year, all the eligible competitors gathered at eight in the evening in the largest conference room that the building had.

  
The prize never changed: The right to ask for one thing from Johnny-san. No matter what they wanted, Johnny would do his best to get it for them, so long as they managed to beat all the other groups in the Death-match.

  
On the first of March every year, all friendships and camaraderie between the competitors did not exist. There was only the unwavering trust in your bandmates, and if you were a solo singer or an actor, in yourself.

  
The younger ones, just as Arashi used to do before they were introduced to the Death-match, wondered about their seniors’ weird behavior on this day every year, but did not dare to ask any questions. The last one that asked got the fright of his life at the look in his sempai’s eyes, and only the vague answer of “Only time will tell.”

  
At eight in the evening on the dot, all competitors received their ping-pong balls with their members’ names on it. They were given half an hour to hide their ping-pong balls anywhere in the massive infrastructure that was JE’s main building. No place was safe in the building on this night.

  
The members of Arashi were new to the competition, but they had planned where they were going to hide their ping-pong balls the moment the introduction to the Death-match was done. They had planned everything out meticulously for the past six months, and now it would come into play.

  
Aware of the slowly decreasing time limit, they rushed to a corner where Ohno took out his paint and brushes that he had set aside for this occasion, specifically using paint that would not take long to dry, and set about disguising their ping-pong balls.

  
Within fifteen minutes, the ping-pong balls were covered in fresh designs and their names were not visible. Blowing on them to make them dry faster, they quickly split up and made their way to the locations they had decided on.

  
They were surprised to find that they met no one on their way to their decided locations – they had thought that these locations would be easily thought of and would be one of the first places that people would look to in order to hide their ping-pong balls, but apparently not.

  
As soon as the last of them had hidden his ping-pong ball, the sound of a bell echoing through the hallways of the building sounded through the public announcement system that the building had. The Death-match had started.

  
They had until eleven to find as many ping-pong balls as possible, and pray that theirs had not been found. Two and a half hours to ensure complete annihilation. If members of a group passed by each other when moving from place to place, tactics to slow them down or hinder them were perfectly acceptable.

  
However, under no circumstances were they allowed to hit any visible body part, nor were they allowed to use sexual advances to prevent them from searching for ping-pong balls.

  
The public announcement system crackled to life every few minutes, announcing names as ping-pong balls were found. When ping-pong balls were found, the person that found it had to take a photo of it and send it to either Johnny’s or Julie’s phones, where the names would then be announced.

  
The jail was also in the office, and slowly, the room filled up with more and more people. After one and a half hours, Toma and Kazama were out, along with three of the V6 members, four of the SMAP members, Tsubasa, three of the TOKIO members and their great senior, Masahiko Kondo. None of the Arashi members’ ping-pong balls had been found thus far. 

  
Slowly, as the time limit decreased, the members of the groups became more desperate, tearing apart rooms without regard for the things that were inside in order to find the ping-pong balls.

  
Only Arashi remained outwardly calm, steadily making their way through the building floor by floor, room by room. Not one room was left untouched, and slowly, the jailed artistes realized that not only were all of the Arashi members still alive, they were systematically finding all of the other artistes’ ping-pong balls and eliminating them.

  
Finally, with ten minutes on the clock left, Johnny announced the last name and decreed that the annual Death-match had come to an end. The Arashi members left to retrieve their ping-pong balls and returned to the jail, which they entered with a pouch bag each, filled with ping-pong balls.

  
When questioned on where they hid their ping-pong balls, they just smiled and said that telling the others would be giving up an advantage that the five of them wanted to keep.

  
When Johnny asked them what they wanted as their prize for winning the annual death-match, they replied that they wanted their concert that year to be held at Kokuritsu Stadium. Johnny laughed and nodded, agreeing despite knowing that it was a difficult task.

  
It goes without being said that every year after that, Arashi won consecutively. When Johnny informed them that Kokuritsu could not be used as a prize any more, they promptly replied with “Then, we want a concert in Hawaii for our fifteenth year anniversary.”

  
Needless to say, their wishes, as the first in the Death-match for the seventh year consecutively, were granted.

  
The seniors and the juniors that joined after them complained every year about not being able to find the places where Arashi hid their ping-pong balls, but they still refused to say a word about the locations. 

  
That was a secret that would remain with them, as they had planned for these locations for so long. No one would find out about them, unless they had Nino’s strategic brain, Sho’s logical mind, Aiba’s imagination, Ohno’s artistic skills, and Jun’s innovation.

  
Which would mean never. 

  
And that was the way they liked it.


End file.
